The transportation industry has acted as the backbone of the United States’ economy for much of its existence, and now robotics (and related concepts like machine learning and artificial intelligence) are taking things one step further. Robotics can be used to offset a lot of the challenges, most importantly safety risks inherent in the transportation industry, in ways that are certainly worth exploring.
Robotics and the Transportation Industry: What You Need to Know
One of the major reasons why robotics is making an impression across the transportation industry ultimately comes down to how these solutions can make our lives not just easier, but safer.
As an example, robotic maintenance vehicles are being developed to be deployed onto roads across the United States. These vehicles are equipped with components like six-axis industrial robots that can be used to safely pick up road cones, all without requiring human operators beyond driving and overseeing. They can also perform other various standard maintenance jobs like crack sealing and road inspection – all while being guided by artificial intelligence in a way that allows the RMV to perform each task on its own without the need for direct human intervention.
This mean that traditional road crews can be relocated to those jobs that truly need them, all while keeping them away from dangerous road work zones. Not only does this go a long way towards eliminating accidents, but it also helps road crews (and the transportation companies that employ them) maximize productivity across the board, allowing workers to go home to their families every night. According to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), between 2003 and 2017 approximately 1,844 workers sadly lost their lives at road construction sites across the country – coming in at an average of about 123 per year. During the same period, 67% of those deaths involved workers in the categories of highway maintenance employees, construction equipment operators, construction laborers and first-line supervisors of construction and extraction workers. By using robotics to allow operators to remain in the truck cab and not directly exposed to motorists passing by, all while guaranteeing to increases efficiency, improve traffic flow and literally saves lives – all in one fell swoop.
The Pioneer Industrial Systems Approach
Based out of Alvordton, Ohio, the team at Pioneer Industrial Systems takes a great deal of pride in its ability to offer custom solutions for not only clients in the transportation industry, but in a wide range of others. By remaining brand independent, Pioneer has put itself in an excellent position to work through each stage of a project with clients – from evaluating the application concept to design, build, commissioning and more. This allows them to leverage their full expertise to create a full competitive advantage for companies.
If you’d like to find out more information about implementing robots and automation to offset the challenges and risks in the transportation industry, or if you have any additional questions, please contact Pioneer Industrial Systems today.
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